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A Game of Thrones: The Board Game

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The second edition of A Game of Thrones: The board game is a worthy successor of the first edition that had become highly popular with people. A number of new additions and innovations have enhanced the scale and grandeur of the game. The second edition is highly recommended because of the high entertainment it affords along with the best quality production value that makes it a must buy for those who are board game lovers. While playing this game with your near and dear ones, you are transported into a different world altogether where the fight for control of the kingdom becomes your first and foremost concern. You get so engrossed in the battle for sovereignty that you become oblivious to your surroundings for the time being.

This truly happens when you delve into an adventurous ride with so many soldiers to fight for you. Equipped with lots of weapons, your army takes on your friends who, just like you, are aspirant to be the undefeated ruler of the most desired throne. Beautiful Design Makes it Highly Recommendable: What you get to notice in the first place is the captivating design, and the beautifully crafted map of the Westeros. The borders and boundaries of the territories are well-marked whereby one territory gets clearly differentiated from others. Everything is so beautiful about the overall package that you are just fascinated by it. Tokens are also made out of standard material so that players at once identify them without in any way being puzzled by which player they belong to. The quality of the cards is also top-notch and the distinguished colors catch one’s fancy. In fact, the game is worth every penny when it comes to the quality of the constituents of the board game. Plastic figures representing knights, footmen, boats and siege machines are deftly crafted with distinct colors so that players easily come to know which house these miniatures belong to.

High Entertainment Quotient Makes it a Must Buy: It is a game of treachery, scheming and lots of planning. It can be played by 3 to 6 players each of whom are named after one of the six houses, namely Lannister, Baratheon, Greyjoy, Stark, Tyrell and Martell. The game is time-consuming with a number of mind-boggling twists and turns. The game becomes highly enjoyable when 6 players sit around the table and take recourse to all sorts of diplomacy, treachery, plotting, secret alliances, and warfare to outdo other players. Warriors and soldiers are sent with siege machines to take control over the twenty citadels on the well-marked territory. All this becomes very entertaining as the game progresses with lots of ups and downs during the ten rounds of the game. In the pursuit of supremacy, the player who holds the most of the citadels at the end of the round ten comes out the winner, though controlling seven of the castles before the conclusion of the round ten makes one the undisputed ruler of Westeros.

The game is quite easy to play though it seems quite complicated at first. It is a game of making the right decision at the right time though you may have to deceive your most trustworthy friend to move forward. You have to believe others to win and if you don’t betray your most trusted friends, you can’t win. It is such back-stabbing and earning friendships that make the game so interesting. This game becomes all the more entertaining because of the verbal exchange of words between the players who laugh, cry, swear and back-stab. What makes it a good buy is the comprehensive book of rules that duly elaborates upon all the rules. Having played it just once or twice, you will be familiar with almost all the rules. Two quick reference sheets provided in the games are helpful in dealing with special situations.

The Captivating Structure of the Game: The game goes through 10 rounds with each round having three phases that are the be-all and end-all. The Westeros phase requires cards to be drawn that further makes events take place. In fact, decisions are made in this phase. The main part of the game is the Planning phase in which you plan. You can invade, defend, support, gain dominance, gain power. You will also indulge in making alliances which will affect the course of the game. In the last Action phase, you carry out what you had planned in the planning phase. All this is pretty simple to understand, but what makes the game really enjoyable is how you betray your friends and get betrayed in return. This game is about deals to be made and deals to be broken.

Pluses: The game is unique as every time you play it, you experience turbulent emotions. Even when it is played repeatedly by the same people, it affords the different experience. The board, cards, and tokens are made out of the high-quality material with minimal damage over a long period. It is quite easy to make a decent judgment call on where you will and won’t succeed in your military endeavors. Unit strengths are easy to understand as you can look through your opponent’s house cards at any time. You won’t be able to do that only when they are actively picking the card they are playing, and the math is pretty simple. This game encourages better position with military units that makes you reach the dominating position. You have to manage your armies and your cards very judiciously in order to get ahead of others in this game. You have to know how to manipulate your losses to effectively win. This adds a completely new level of strategic complexity that you don’t often see in other games. Moreover, it is the strategic depth of the game that makes it so appealing.

Minuses: You may hate A Game of Thrones: The board game because it is really a time-consuming affair. With 6 players around the table, it may go over 6 hours that become too tiring. Some of the players may lose their interest in the game by the time it ends. What goes against the game is the 4 player format as the Greyjoys always seem to be on the losing end with everything going against them from the very beginning. The book of rules too looks quite lengthy and difficult to understand. With so many cards, tokens and miniatures on the board, the newbies feel perplexed in the beginning, though the fact is that the game is not difficult at all. It may take 20 to 30 minutes for one to understand the rules of the game. Still, the vastness and scale of the game sometimes go against it.

To sum up, A Game of Thornes: The Board Game, the Second Edition is a game full of surprises with sudden twists and turns. Alliances are formed and broken as per one’s wish and need. The players embark upon an adventurous journey in their pursuit to control the iron throne. The pluses far outweigh the minuses which can be overlooked as insignificant.